Journey's Beginning
by SilverWolf7
Summary: Jackie takes the Doctor home with her after the beach. Post Journey's End story.


Disclaimer: The characters in this story aren't mine. They belong to the BBC.

And, hopefully this is better in the editing department. This was the version that was meant to go up, but I accidentally put on the wrong file.

Journey's Beginning

There was something wrong. It wasn't in anything anyone did or said, in fact it was the opposite. It was what wasn't being said. Or done. Or...something like that.

Rose had been quiet and for the most part ignoring everything around her, but that was just like the last time she had said goodbye to the Doctor. She was grieving once again the loss of the life she wanted and the TARDIS and the person she knew. The real Doctor. The Doctor that wasn't here right now.

It had taken them three days to get back to London, a few hours to get back to the mansion she lived in with Pete and her son, Tony. Rose had moved out after the first year. They had already dropped her off home.

The Doctor was still with her. He had wanted to give Rose the space she might need, or at least that's what she thought he was doing, because since grabbing her hand after the TARDIS had disappeared on the beach and saying a few words to Rose, he had yet to speak again.

She needed to talk to him, see how he was, because if there was one thing she knew about the Doctor, any version of him, it was that he loved to talk.

Tony was at a day care centre for the day, seeing as how it was Pete who had come to pick her up. So at the moment it was one less worry off her shoulders.

She had just noticed that the Doctor was trembling slightly. Had he been doing that the entire time, or had it just started? She didn't know, but she knew right then that something had to be said. "You could have gone with Rose, you know?"

The Doctor, the copy of him, the one that was half human and would live out a life the same as her or her daughter looked at her and the look in his eyes almost made her cry. "She doesn't want me."

She hadn't liked the Doctor much, especially when he had the northern accent and big ears, but this made her want to mother him. He looked so utterly lost, poor thing. "She never stopped wanting you."

A small giggle which held no humour at all passed his lips and he shook his head. "No, she wants the one who went off in the TARDIS, the other me. She wants that life and I can't give it to her. Not anymore I can't. I don't know what to do Jackie."

Frowning, Jackie grabbed his arm, and guided him into the kitchen, where she put him on a seat, before making tea. "Well, give her a few months to calm down. She'll be back, you'll see."

He snorted. "Oh yeah, like I'm going to believe that. Probably swan off with the next guy who comes looking just to spite me."

That...wasn't him. Not the Doctor she knew. Oh sure, he might use similar words, but not that way. He seemed to notice it too. "Damn it! Sorry, I have...bits of Donna's temperament about me too. Part of the process of...being made I suppose. Her human side and her mannerisms. Oh, this is going to be a blast..."

And now he was just being sarcastic. "Apart from the human parts of you, you still are...you know, him though, aren't you?"

He looked at her and grinned. "Oh yes! Don't mind me. I'm going to start having a nervous break down now..."

His head hit the table. Jackie rolled her eyes. Now he was being melodramatic. "I know what it's like being stuck on an Earth that isn't familiar you known. And with a person who was someone I knew and loved dearly, but wasn't the same man. Give it time. Look how well it turned out for me and Pete. You'll meet Tony soon. He's 3 now. They grow up so fast..."

She hadn't meant to upset him, but it was clear to see what had supposed to have cheered him up was doing the opposite. He glanced up at her and looked haunted. "Jackie. I have spent most of my life travelling from one place to another because I was afraid of stopping. Now I'm stuck. For the rest of my life. And I've only got one of those now...one life. Human lifespan. I'm what...mid 30's? Anything could happen...anything. I could die any second now. Just...drop dead of unknown causes. Or have a heart attack. Have only one now. One heart. And it beats so fast. Too fast. I'm having a heart attack, oh god!"

Jackie waited for a few seconds before sighing, going over to him and gently begun rubbing his Back and telling him to breathe slowly, because he was hyperventilating. "Calm down Doctor, you're fine, just letting everything get to you that's all. You're scaring yourself silly." And it was odd, because she had never seen the Doctor do that before, and from what she saw of Donna she wasn't the type to panic at all. And Rose would probably vouch for that one, having met the woman a few times by now.

After he was focused on his breathing and calm, she sat down on the seat beside him, still rubbing his back in small circles and smiled. "There! See? You're fine."

"But I don't know what to do! Literally, I have no idea. I have no money, know no one but you and Rose, and right now that is no good to me at all because the both of you have changed so much, you have a child and Rose is ignoring me completely, and I'm just...stuck. I don't know one thing about anything to do with getting a job, or what kind I would even be able to get into to begin with. I have no papers saying I exist, no name, no nothing! I've lost my TARDIS, and my sonic screwdriver and my psychic paper. I have nothing. Nothing! Not one thing but the clothes on me. A pair of clothes...the entire world and all I have in it is a stupid suit..."

Jackie sighed and nodded. She had learnt ages ago that when the Doctor started yammering on, he yammered for a good long while, and this was one rant he really did need to have. "I'll take you shopping tomorrow then. Buy you some nice clothes. Some business suits and some casual wear..."

"Casual wear? Casual wear! For what? Lounging about the house when I'm not working, sleeping or eating? Damn you! Damn _him_ for leaving me here. Damn the WHOLE DAMN UNIVERSE! WHY DOES EVERYTHING BAD ALWAYS HAPPEN TO ME?!"

"Why did he leave you here like this?" She had to ask, because she hadn't heard on the beach and no one had talked about it since.

"Punishment and the big supplementary prize is mine. That being Rose. Oh how bloody kind of the other me to do that yeah? He swans off leaving both of us in a place we don't want to be because he can't stand to be around her and because I happened to kill the Daleks much like he did once upon a time, and decided that I'm a bloody bastard who doesn't even have the right to exist in the same time and place as him. Oh, there were other reasons. Good reasons probably, but right now I'm just too pissed off to think clearly on it."

Well, at least he was admitting to being angry. She hated it when people were snippy and denied it. "Well, you're free to stay here for as long as you need. Help with Tony, go job hunting...I'm sure Pete could set you up with papers and things like that. He did with Rose at any rate. He leads Torchwood on this side of the...universes."

He looked at her for a while, took a deep breath and let it out in a rush. "Yeah, thanks. Sorry. I'm being more of a pain than I normally am. I've been told I'm...hard to live with. Yet again, technically, I've only been in existence for a few days...I hate this. Hate it."

She nodded, because she knew he did. Everything in his shouting, his words, the way he spoke, how he held himself, all hunched up and ready to jump right out of his skin just to be someone different right then. Anyone other than him. "He's you," she said quietly, making sure never to stop with her rubbing. She was afraid if she did right then he would completely fly off the handle. She was grounding him right now, or so it felt.

"Yeah. Me. But I'm half human. One heart, one life, one chance. Everything I was, everything I am is gone now Jackie...I tried so hard. I did. But I could never fit in anywhere...and now I am stuck, like I was before I took the TARDIS, and it is like my entire life has come down to this. Everything repeating itself after everything has been destroyed. Is this some sick sort of universal poetic justice? What the hell did I do wrong to deserve this?"

Jackie didn't understand everything about him. He was after all an alien, this version only half so, to her. Not once did she think to him it might be the other way around. That the humans, her race, were the aliens. That his way of thinking and doing things would be different enough to make it harder for him to hold onto a job in the first place.

How come she hadn't ever thought of that before? And now he was stuck here, a stranger in a place that was only partly familiar because of it being an alternate version to what he knew. Just like he himself was an alternate version of himself.

"Oh Doctor, I'm so sorry. This must be hell on you."

And that was an understatement.

"Hell? This is hell. This is my worst nightmare come true. I'm stuck. No way of getting away and this world is too small for me. I need to travel to other places, and before they invent the kind of space travel that could even remotely make up for what I am used to, I'd be dead for centuries...dead."

Pulling him close until his head was resting on her shoulder, she hugged him. "Doctor...come on. How about we go do something now? I could break open the wine and we can get blind and try to forget the bad things. Or we could go on that shopping trip you need. Or we could...I dunno, pick out a room for you in this cavernous old place. Speaking of...where did Pete disappear off to?"

A slight shrug of one shoulder was her answer, and she decided the room would be the best bet, since he seemed to be sapped of energy, which really didn't surprise her. She doubted he had slept the past three days, and he was half human now and would need a decent amount of sleep probably, and his yelling had probably taken a bit out of him too. Poor thing, he must be dead on his feet. She would have said that last out loud if he wasn't absolutely terrified that any small thing he did would result in instant death.

She wanted him close to her, just in case he needed anything, so she decided the room that had used to be Rose's but was now a study with a bed in it (Pete slept there when he was up late working on a project and didn't want to wake her), would be right for him.

Someone had to look after him while he gained his feet, and Rose came back.

She knew Rose would come back for him, but it would definitely take some time for them to start anything.

It would be like a brand new start for them. It was good in a way, since both of them were different to the last time they were together.

They all had some pretty hard decisions to make, choices that would ultimately become their life together, but before that happens, they both needed to grieve over what they had lost.

"Come on Doctor, you can have the bedroom next to mine and Pete's."

He stood up and waited meekly by her side, while she led the way to the bedroom in question, a slight detour to Tony's room in which she grabbed one of the stuffed animals, a blue bunny with floppy ears, and gave it to the Doctor. By the time she had tucked him in, because he refused to get under the covers any other way, he was asleep with the bunny clutched tightly in his hands.

She left him to it. Nothing else she could do.

Was it wrong of her that when she was in bed that night, Pete snuggled up to her side snoring softly, that she felt utter relief to hear him crying?

No.

He needed that as well.

She fell asleep knowing that the real problems would start tomorrow, but that somehow he'd find his way in the human world. He'd make his choices, and he would live with them.

Right then, he was just like everyone else.


End file.
